The U.S. doesn’t run, from anything. At least that’s the story they tell you at jingoistic patriot rallies and Boy Scout camps. Yet it turns out that’s not the case, because U.S. baseball manager Davey Johnson is making noise that he’ll withdraw the team from the ongoing World Baseball Classic’s second round — or semifinals, should it advance that far — if further injuries strike the squad.
According to the ASSOCIATED PRESS, Johnson says he will forfeit if he runs out of players at any positions. And before you scoff that off as hyperbole, you should consider how close he already is to that point: The U.S. had to call in Brian Roberts, the reserve infielder, when he was out at dinner. Now he’s the only second baseman left on the roster.
How big a statement would the U.S. be making if the country that invented baseball pulled out of only the second World Baseball Classic? A big one, that’s for sure. Yet as more players criticize the practice methods and over-inflated early intensity of the WBC, the entire tournament is being thrown back into question, even as the Netherlands (recently and dearly departed), Japan, Korea, Venezuela and Puerto Rico author a pretty intriguing script.
It’s a strange emerging dichotomy that’s hard to bridge, both for the American public and, surely, the commissioner’s office as well.
If Davey Johnson doesn’t want the job of leading the U.S., we think we know a guy who does: One particular British cop, if he can learn anything about baseball. After all, right now he’s heading over to L.A. to be an assistant coach with the Galaxy, and that’s hardly at the level of a national team gig.
Think about what’s he’s already getting though! In one fell swoop, Community Support Officer Andy Bridgman is going from organizing a “Shopwatch” to coaching David Beckham and Landon Donovan.
That’s the MLS for you: They’ll spend $30 million+ on two players on a roster, but they’d rather bring over a cop from England on a psuedo loan than hire a half-decent trained coach.
A coaching scout for Major League Soccer called him late last year to offer him the job and he is taking a 12-month career break to accept it.”How many people get this kind of opportunity?” he said.
“Not only to play football full-time but also to work alongside the top teams in America? It’s fantastic. At first I thought, it’s not real.”
Well, we hardly thought it was real at first, either, but it checks out. Unfortunately, the MLS doesn’t check out itself.
If you’re like us, you waited all day yesterday for the real NCAA show: The Women’s Tournament Selection Show! What’s that? You didn’t watch it? Ahhh, well, we didn’t either. But we did read enough to learn that the four No. 1 seeds are U-Conn., Maryland, Duke and Oklahoma.
More interesting is the bracket breakdown, with Duke landing the top seed in the Western (Berkeley) Region. Who’s the No. 2 there? Why, Stanford, which happens to play less than an hour away from the site of the Sweet 16 and Elite 8. If that seems a bit unfair to you, it does to us, too. Not that it’s unprecedented, of course, but it sure does minimize the advantage of being the No. 1 seed. After all, if you can’t beat a 15, then you don’t deserve to go anywhere in the tournament. And if you can’t beat a 7, then you probably should have been a 1 or 2 seed anyway.
Once you get past that point, the site and fan presence at the event are as important as anything else, and that’s where Stanford will have a huge advantage. That’s not to say Duke won’t pull it off, it’s just a matter of the smart money being on Stanford.
You just thought Binghamton was having a great month because of the NCAA Tournament. It really isn’t. Why? Because of this Serbian lunatic.
Why can’t teams just keep wearing the uniforms, warm ups and shoes they’ve sported all year when they make the tournament? We’re so sick of this March marketing already. With that in mind, here’s Louisville’s new duds and kicks.
Rasheed Wallace, aspiring economist. Who would have thought? Maybe Dean Smith, actually.
THE BIG LEAD posted this yesterday, but it really is a must see if you’ve ever doubted the credibility of either Jay Bilas or Dicky-V. One of them is wrong in this scenario, no matter how you slice it.
Are you a degenerate gambler? Just curious about how the Vegas lines are moving heading into the NCAA tourney? Well, this fascinating post is for you.
Is Roy Jones. Jr’s heart really still in the fighting? Or are these bouts just huge publicity stunts? Read this interview and tell us, why don’t you.
Did idiotic Chelsea defender Ashley Cole — husband of the almost perfect Cheryl Cole — get set up for an arrest by an employee of a tabloid? Someone thinks he did.
Finally, are those shoes on Victoria Beckham’s feet, or did she step on a couple birds? We’re really not sure.
Why do we continue to give college basketball a pass on “March Madness” when the Final Four takes place during April? Sure, you’re sitting there and thinking, “So only 61 of the 64 games happen in the right month? So?” It’s the principle of it all, damn it! I can’t make a PG movie that turns R-rated in the last 5 minutes. It’d be like that one Mandy Moore movie A Walk to Remember, where (SPOILER ALERT!) she dies at the end, except in this version it’s by getting her head ripped off by naked zombies. Actually, get Hollywood on the phone; that idea sounds like a winner.
But we digress. Even people in the deepest of comas know that today is just the first day of a week in which worker productivity plummets and everyone, for at least a couple days, is a college basketball fan. Today is reserved for staring at a bracket, cursing the fact that the talking heads on ESPN like the same upsets you do (making them both popular and wrong, which completely disqualifies them as keys to winning your pool). Lots of office printers being tied up today. UPSET PROTIP: Think about American in the Elite 8. You’ll be happy you did. High fives all around!
Technically, yes, the rest of the sports world doesn’t stand still, and there’s plenty of things to talk about away from the parquet. We’re happy to report that your national pride has been granted an extension of legitimacy, as the USA defeated the Nether Region Netherlands, 9-3. Up next is either Venezuela or Puerto Rico, depending on who loses between the two teams tonight.
On the other side of the WBC bracket or however they set this thing up, Japan and Korea have jumped out to strong positions, while Mexico and Cuba fight to avoid elimination tonight. Quick question: why is the Mexico-Cuba game being played, essentially, in the middle of the night? And we get that this is a “world” classic and this time makes it possible for the rest of the world to watch, but 95-99% of the people who actually give a single crap about this game live in Mexico and Cuba (not a slight at those two countries, by the way; you could substitute any two teams in there, and the fact remains the same), and you’re essentially playing the game while they sleep. Wouldn’t almost anything be better than a start time that’s still late (8 pm) in San Diego, where the game is being held.
And speaking of situations in need of repair, can we talk about Jay Cutler and Denver? Talks have gone swimmingly after that trade kerfuffle from earlier, and Cutler is eager to get started on the 2009 season and develop a positive relationship with his new coach. LOL JUST KIDDING I AM LYING BADLY. Cutler has now left the city of Denver and demanded a trade, according to the DENVER POST.
(In this case, “thumbs up” means “I hate you.”)
And perhaps it’s just us, but like the Denver Post’s Mike Klis, we get the notion that Bill Belichick is probably a bigger factor in this mess than it would initially appear. Here’s how Klis’ version of the situation basically went down.
Josh McDaniels: I’m the coach at Denver now! Isn’t this great, Bill?
Belicheck: Call me Mr. Belichick, you little sh*t. How are you doing at quarterback? You want Cassel?
JM: Not particularly. We have Cutler.
BB: Cassel’s better. We can get a 3-way trade done. You want Cassel.
JM: Um, that’d be kinda cool, but we have Cutler.
BB: Oh. Huh. Weird.
NFL: Cassel has been traded to Kansas City for basically nothing.
BOSTON GLOBE: Denver was talking about trading Cutler for Cassel.
Jay Cutler: What the hell. Screw you. I’m leaving.
JM: Say, Mr. Belichick? Now I have neither Cassel nor Cutler.
BB: NYEAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I always liked Pioli better!
JM: I hate you, Mr. Belichick. Some more links to peruse while you’re still thinking, “American? They face Villanova in Philly in Round 1! That’s stupid!” Stupid like a fox!
Manny Ramirez is already on the shelf with a bum hamstring. Good thing those injuries don’t linger.
And speaking of WBC injuries, Chipper Jones, Dustin Pedroia, and Ryan Braunare all out. Why do we get the feeling George Steinbrenner would never stand for this?
You young folks with your rap and video games may not know it, but these videos that HOME RUN DERBY found show that Pete Rose was one damned fine aftershave salesman back in the day. Observe:
If you heard that your favorite NBA team scored 130 points in a blowout, odds are pretty good that you’d be thrilled. Except, of course, if you live in the Bay Area; that optimism would be replaced by fear and dread. Yes, today’s hilarious lack of NBA defense comes from… the same team it always comes from, the Golden State Warriors. Yes, they dropped 130, but they gave up 154 points to Phoenix, and that’s with most of the Suns’ starters on the bench for the vast majority of the 4th quarter. Jason Richardson dropped 31 points on only 15 shots.
Maglio Ordonez is one of the more decorated Venezuelans in baseball history. He’s still a major leaguer, he’s a former All-Star and a proud countryman. All of that should make him a huge hit at the ongoing World Baseball Classic, where the Venezuelans landed a big second round victory over the Netherlands yesterday. But it isnt working out that way. Instead, Ordonez is being boooed like A-Rod in Boston, and it’s all because of his political beliefs.
According to the ASSOCIATED PRESS, the disagreement between Ordonez and his country’s rabid fans stems from a series of current commercials in Venezuela. In the ads, the slugger advocates for the abolition of presidential term limits, a move which is patently aimed at getting more time in office for controversial head of state/autocrat Hugo Chavez. The controversial president has long exploited Ordonez’s success and fame for his own gain (no surprise there) as you can see in the video after the break, where Chavez holds a press conference to congratulate Ordonez’s past accomplishemts. While some, like fiery White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen weren’t so receptive, Ordonez has always been happy to play Chavez’s patsy. Needless to say, that’s not going over too well with the more liberal Venezuelans (i.e., expats in the U.S. and other countries) who have to watch Ordonez’s ugly mug — and horrible hair — in ads for a guy they’ve been fighting to push away for years.
If you are only going to hit one basket in a game, hitting the shot that sends your team to the NCAA Tournament is good time to do it. And that’s just what Robert Morris University guard Dallas Green did (not the former big league manager), picking up a loose ball and draining a baseline jumper with 2.5 seconds left to give the Colonials a dramatic 48-46 victory over Mount St. Mary’s to win the Northeast Conference Championship.
But as exciting as the final three seconds or so were, the first 39 minutes and 57 seconds were just as ugly. As in, “hey, look, ‘Sports Soup’ is on!” bad. The second half was pretty rough to watch, and that was a huge upgrade over the first half: the halftime score was 19-19, and the leading scorer for the game was RMU’s Jeremy Chappell (seen below celebrating) with 15 points.
But in the end, it was Green who provided the heroics. Which rubbed his opponents the wrong way:
Mount St. Mary’s guard Jeremy Goode was particularly stung that Green — a player who even Robert Morris coach Mike Rice admitted was the fifth option on the play — was the player who hit the decisive shot.
“It hurts more,” Goode said. “You’d rather see a guy who makes shots the whole time he has been here make the game-winner. Not [Green] though.”
I’m sure that Green is going to be very upset about those comments…as he and his teammates prepare for the NCAA Tournament, while the Mount St. Mary’s team prepares for a long off-season. But based on the game last night, I doubt that Green or that rest of the Robert Morris team should be game planning for more than one game.
There was another ticket punched to the Big Dance last night which also ended in dramatic fashion. Portland State squeaked past huge underdog Montana State team (who finished the season 14-17) to win the Big Sky Championship. The Vikings also used a last-second shot to clinch their spot, as Julius Thomasdunked with 3.5 seconds left for the winning points in their 79-77 victory. Hopefully they can avoid being a No. 16 seed again, like they were last year before getting thumped by Kansas.
(And about the crash that killed “Mask” Lewis: the police are now looking into street racing as a cause of the accident, and it turns out that Lewis had at least eight traffic violations since 2001, including a DUI.)
Mel Kiper Jr. apparently hates Jay Cutler something fierce, according to RUMORS AND RANTS, who have transcribed his diatribe on the suddenly-maligned Denver (for now) quarterback. Not only does Kiper say that the media hype around Cutler was so ridiculous “I had to run to the bathroom quick. It was making me ill,” - I assume he checked his hair after throwing up - he also compares Cutler to He Who Must Not Be Named (Jeff George).
The LOS ANGELES TIMES says that the LAPD are re-opening the case of Howie Steindler, the boxing trainer who was the inspiration for Rocky Balboa’s trainer Mickey Goldmill and was murdered 32 years ago (and not by the angry words of one Clubber Lang.)
San Jose mayor Chuck Reed tells MSNBC that the “odds are better than 50/50” of the A’s relocating there from Oakland. Of course, MLB would still need to remove territorial rights to San Jose from the Giants, which is probably why A’s owner Lew Wolff was - as SHYSTER BALL notes - sucking up to Bud Selig last week.
Venezuela defeated the US 5-3 in the World Baseball Classic in a fairly meaningless game (both teams had already made the quarterfinals), despite what ESPN chronicles as simmering tensions over President Hugo Chavezthreaten to boil over for the team and its fans.
FOOD COURT LUNCH breaks down some SABRmetric terms you probably don’t know, like Spouse Slugging (leaders include Brett Myers and Elijah Dukes) and Scrappiness Index (David Eckstein).
The ATLANTA JOURNAL CONSTITUTION says that tickets to the ACC Tournament, once one of the toughest to get in all of college sports, are now yours for the taking as the event is not a sellout, with almost 10,000 seats remaining unsold.
Hey, remember when Notre Dame was everyone’s trendy pick for a Final Four dark horse? Perhaps everyone meant NIT Final Four, as that’s where the Fighting Irish are heading after getting bounced from the Big East Tournament by West Virginia.
By now you’ve probably noticed that the Netherlands upset the Dominican Republic in baseball. In fact, as Tuffy mentioned in the Speed Read directly below this post, they did it a second time with even more gumption and dramatics then they had in beating the D.R.’s All-Stars the first time around. This time, a 20-year-old minor league prospect from the Twins system named Tom Stuifbergen matched Ubaldo Jimenez and Pedro Martinez out for out. After finally giving up a run in extra innings — hard to fault them for allowing Jose Reyes to score from second on a clear base hit into the outfield — they responded with two. That, friends, is clutch.
(Tennessee, the Netherlands … maybe he just needs to keep wearing orange?)
So who, pray tell, is the man behind these wins? Well, his name is Rod Delmonico, and you’ve almost certainly never heard of him unless you’re really, really into college baseball. After a career that started in 1981, Delmonico was an assistant and head coach at Clemson, Florida State and Tennessee. But then, after a long collegiate career, Delmonico left the Volunteers in 2007 for an amorphous position with MLB that may have made him the perfect manager for the Netherlands, and just the type of man who could help a team put on a magical run in the World Baseball Classic.
Pittsburgh is a strange place. It’s in Pennsylvania, but it feels like the rust belt of Ohio. It’s considered part of the Northeast, but it feels more like Gary, Indiana, during it’s (albeit brief) boom period than it does like Philadelphia, which is right on the other side of the state.
(The man on the left could be Pittsburgh’s next mayor.)
Perhaps most importantly, the entire life of the city revolves around the fortunes of a single sports team: The Steelers. If the black-and-gold wins, then everyone’s happy. If the Steelers lose, well, then you might want to grab the next flight to Cincinnati. After all, no one gives a crap about football there.
Why are we bringing up the rather obvious massive popularity of Steelers football? Because the son of one of the franchise’s most famous players is about to run for mayor. Franco “Dok” Harrisofficially announced his candidacy on Monday. That’s not the Franco Harris you remember from Steelers Super Bowls, it’s the Franco Harris who the Super Bowl Franco Harris gave birth to.
According to a press release posted on the Pittsburgh sports blog MONDESI’S HOUSE, Harris the younger lists accomplishments like his graduation from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law and Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business, not a boatload of touchdowns. But that may not matter to Pittsburgh voters, half of whom probably won’t be able to tell the difference between the two Harrises.
All of this begs the question of just how far one man can get on a famous name, particularly if it isn’t his. Yes, Dok Harris has some professional accomplishments in the legal and business community, but the only reason he’s even notable is because he’s Franco Harris’s son. If that lands him the Pittsburgh mayoral office, that might be an all-time record for long-distance coattail riding.
Here’s Dok Harris’s best political speak, in an excerpt from his press release:
As your mayor, the Pittsburgh of tomorrow will be an economic powerhouse; a green city that is a friend to businesses both small and large. Our city will work for our workers by ensuring fair wages and fair treatment. The Pittsburgh of tomorrow will be the intersection of labor and technology, where both startups and large corporations will benefit from the hard working blue collar spirit of our community and the intellectual trust of our universities. As your mayor I commit to building Pittsburgh into that city upon a hill - or in this case, three rivers – as an example of the role that good government has in our common successful future. I ask you to join me on this journey. Together, we will Forge Ahead.
We’ll see how Harris does, but he definitely bears watching, if only for historical significance, both for his father and the future of celebrity in America.
We’re still getting into the full swing of March Madness, but one of Monday night’s games emphasized the second word in the phrase, thanks to some bizarre referring that gave one team a 1-0 lead before the opening tip off.
(Josh Heytvelt dunked, too, just not in warm-ups.)
The official pregame indiscretion was committed by St. Mary’s, which fell to Gonzaga in Monday night’s West Coast Conference championship. According to this report in the SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, the Gaels were handed a technical foul because they dunked in warm-up drills. You can catch video of the incident below, too.
The last time we checked, every team dunked in warm up drills. The only difference is that other teams tend to deliver psuedo-lay up dunks, hybrid basket drop-ins that vary in force and how clearly they’re acknowledged. On Monday, St. Mary’s was dunking and getting noticed, and that was too much for game officials to accept.
A few hours later, St. Mary’s was left to sit and wait to learn whether it will be able to dunk again this year. In only the second game since the return of the team’s star point guard, Australian Patty Mills, the Gaels were thoroughly undone by a dominant Gonzaga team. The result was a title game walloping that could have hurt the at-large chances of St. Mary’s, not helped them as they’d hoped.
Of course, St. Mary’s didn’t help itself, either, so in a sense it has no one else to blame.
There’s a scary tendency to overlook the pros during March because all eyes are on the impending NCAA Tournament. That’s almost surely going to be the case this month, too, but Dwyane Wade made sure that his resurgence wouldn’t be overlooked, if only for a single day.
In what is easily the NBA shot of the month (yes, we realize we’re less than a third of the way through March), Wade sank the Bulls with a desperation three-pointer in double overtime. It was the latest proof both that Wade loves playing in Miami, and that he may single-handedly put the Heat back in serious contention in the Eastern Conference. No, they’re not competitive with the likes of Boston and Cleveland yet, but anyone who saw Wade dismantle Chicago in the clutch would have to think very seriously about picking the Heat over the likes of Orlando and Atlanta.
After all, Wade didn’t just hit a three to win the game in double-overtime, he also nailed one at the end of the first half and at the end of regulation. That’s incredible. He may not be the next Michael Jordan, but he’s not a bad for a third of a new triumvirate that also includes LeBron James and Kobe Bryant, is he?
That friends, is some clutch shooting. In fact, what’s “clutch” in Spanish? Those “El Heat” jerseys need an appropriate celebratory radio call if you ask us.
You know how sometimes a network will plan coverage based on expected results, then they get hung out to try when really unexpected results follow? Meet Amy Nelson’s ESPN.com column on Canada’s Phillippe Aumont, which launched last night, just as Italy was bouncing the mounties from the WBC.
Speaking of baseball, fringe baseball industries are sure to be affected even more directly by the economic recession than the game itself. How are baseball cards going to react? Check out their future yourself, courtesy 3D glasses and this post on BIG LEAGUE STEW.
We know he’s pretty broke right now, but TASTY BOOZE makes a compelling case for Pacman Jones’s next custom car if he ever makes more cash. Why not an Ecto-1?
The upstart UFL is not about to go quietly into the night before it even gets off the ground. According to this report from PROFOOTBALLTALK, it’s now trying to land Michael Vick to be a face of the franchise in one of its premier cities.
